


A Tainted Grip

by ambivalentlangst



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Langst, Platonic Shance, Whump, platonic corance, platonic plance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-13
Updated: 2018-04-13
Packaged: 2019-04-22 05:23:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14301702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ambivalentlangst/pseuds/ambivalentlangst
Summary: Lance just hopes that when the metal hands leave his skin and the sentry completes its mission, they'll still know it's him.





	A Tainted Grip

**Author's Note:**

> I’ve been pretty inactive for awhile in terms of original content due to school and some exchange pieces I have to get finished, but the concept of one of the reprogrammed sentries from Galra HQ malfunctioning on Lance’s watch wouldn’t leave me alone, so I messed my boy up BAD. This is more whump than angst, though there’s definitely some of both, but I really enjoyed writing something quick and easy. Enjoy!

Lance liked the sentries that they reprogrammed, he liked them a lot. Aside from shooting them off into space, it was fun to have someone to do chores with when Coran told everyone it was cleaning day. They all argued that the sentries could have it tidied up faster than all of their efforts combined, but he twisted his mustache around a gloved finger and declared it a team bonding exercise. As much as they complained about it, Lance couldn’t deny that there was something to be said about the camaraderie forged with the person one scrubbed ten-thousand-year-old showers with. That in mind, Lance clapped the one currently folding his laundry on the back. He headed towards his bed, his space home away from space home–it was still so weird to think of empire ships as friendly, but it was fun to run around them without the threat of being shot hanging over his head, so he wasn’t complaining–and heard a hard thunk.

He winced, pivoting to assess the damage. He normally wasn’t one to break machinery. As good as Hunk was with that sort of thing, Lance knew very well how colorful his friend’s vocabulary could get when he broke a delicate piece. Still, he supposed the hit to the sentry wasn’t exactly gentle. He’d have to get the ship mechanic, if he hadn’t jumped ship like a lot of soldiers after Lotor became emperor, to take a look at the droid later and be sure he hadn’t rattled it around too badly. Other than the sound, it outwardly appeared to be fine.

Lance turned back around, going back to his original course of action. He’d been training quite a bit provided in, as much as he hated to admit it, the calm from Lotor’s new reign, and he was ready for a long, long nap. Then, he heard the robotic voice coming from behind him, saying something that certainly wasn’t anything Pidge had programmed into it.

“Programming override. Mission, destroy Voltron.” Lance’s eyes barely had time to widen before he felt a metal hand on his shoulder, and then felt a curling of the droid’s hand into a fist and the crunch of his shoulder. His scream was muffled by the hand that settled over his mouth, and in his pain Lance was only vaguely aware of the red light cast from the glow of the corrupted machine before he was slammed to the ground, his breath battering his lungs before escaping in a rough exhale. Lance wheezed, the world blurring to a smear of magenta walls while the sentry’s foot came down with sickening force on his outstretched fingers, scrabbling for purchase on the slick ground.

His entire face was stinging from the impact of the fall, and Lance didn’t remember where he’d left his bayard. He couldn’t get to it anyways, not with the way a foot was placed on his back to hold him down. Lance couldn’t for the life of him start breathing right again, and what little air he did manage to take in went to keeping him conscious. Screaming was not an option. There was nothing he could do but accept the beating the sentry gave him, metal fists pummeling his body while he attempted to think of a way out through the pain.

_Whack._

A blow to his ribs, another crack, and Lance tried to remember where the others were. Pidge had mentioned going to the kitchen, but he didn’t know where that was, and Hunk was in the engine room across the whole ship.

_Crunch._

His other hand, and then his ankle, all very quickly. There was a hand fisted in his hair, bringing his head down on the ground while the ringing in his ears intensified. Lance felt a dampness on his cheeks, but he didn’t remember crying. There was only pain, and maybe it was shock, which wasn’t good but Lance wasn’t sure what was good when a programmed warrior was trying to turn him into a pulp of boy and bones and blood. He thought perhaps that was the wetness, then. Blood on his forehead and in his mouth, choking him while he wondered if they could get the stains out of Marco’s jacket. He didn’t let that be washed, because it smelled like home. The first gasping sob was wrought from his lips because he couldn’t stand the idea of coppery blood marring the smell of wrestling in the living room and feeding the dog scraps when his mama wasn’t looking.

_Yelling._

Was he able to scream yet, or had that simple comfort been stolen too? Lance wasn’t sure. Did he even want to know? Another question amongst many, and one he had to ignore because it didn’t matter. Nothing dumb like if he screamed or not would change anything if he died. Lance didn’t want to die, but it was hard to cling to the sentiment when he thought his head might explode from it all, and the purple of the room had turned to crimson somewhere along the way.

_Sizzling._

The blows stopped, but the pain did not cease. It only got worse when Lance felt a heavy, inanimate body fall atop his own, and more tears wormed their way down his cheeks. He hoped they cleared away the blood for whoever found him because he didn’t want to just be a body, indiscriminate from the others they’d seen when they got to planets too late. He wanted them to know who he was, so they could tell his mama what had happened to him. That would still matter, even if he was dying. How could he not be, when everything was electric agony that sung through every nerve in his body and didn’t stop no matter what he did and how he cried and wished for it all to just end, one way or another.

_Dragging._

Small hands went under his shoulders, and he fought to get away because the grip was not so strong, so incredibly overpowering as the last. He had a chance, and he’d do just about anything to stop the blinding pain. Didn’t they know his shoulders were pulverized, just like the rest of him? He tried to tell them as much, screaming and pleading, but they did not stop. Lance fought, up until he tossed his head back and saw green. He knew green. Green gave him the same feeling as looking at his niece, the overwhelming need to protect and shelter her from anything, even himself.

_Nothing._

* * *

Lance woke in a warm embrace, smelling faintly, familiarly like lavender and sweat, like rushing into battle after showering with the castle provided soap. His eyes blinked open slowly, the scar crossing Shiro’s nose first becoming clear before Lance took in the rest of him. Shiro, strange as he was, as of late, for no particular reason Lance could discern, was somebody he could feel safe with.

Shiro smiled.

“How you feeling, buddy?” he asked. Lance let his head loll for a second, trying to come back to himself. He was now awake enough to feel the tackiness his whole body had after a stint in the pods, along with the traces of a headache and general bad aftertaste in his mouth. The pods healed, but weren’t exactly luxurious in their methods. He raised one hand in a sloppy wave, seeing the rest of his team, minus one, of course. It was with a pang that Lance remembered that Keith would not be joining them in greeting anyone released from a pod for a while yet. He looked back to Shiro, letting his head come to rest against his bicep. With a smile, he answered,

“Like I’ve spent a good while in the pods, but otherwise fine. You?” Shiro laughed, helping Lance stand on his own two feet with his hands on his arms to steady him.

“I’m fine, just glad you’re okay.” As soon as Lance flashed a tired thumbs up, he was swamped by the team, and he felt tears dampen the fabric of the suit he’d been put in for the pods while they crushed the life out of him via hugging.

When they pulled back, his eyes landed on Pidge, whose eyes shone with barely restrained emotion.

“I’m so sorry!” she exclaimed, rushing forward and hugging him again, seemingly just for good measure. “When we started reprogramming the sentries, I thought I had my antivirus software installed in all of them, but I must’ve missed some or had a flaw in it somewhere. Some resisting Galra forces hacked in. As soon as it registered to my main console,” Lance would chide her later for eating around her computer, if she’d had to come all the way from the kitchens,“I came over. I didn’t know, didn’t think that without its gun the sentry would be able to do so much damage so quickly.” Lance put his head atop hers, patting her back lightly.

“Don’t worry about it Pidgeon, I’m all good now. I know you did what you could,” he reassured her. Coran was the one to point out that perhaps he was not entirely unchanged.

“Almost good, anyways. You gave us quite the scare, and the bot got a good lick in,” he reminded Lance and spun him to face the surface of the pod in order to see his reflection. Lance saw the truth in his words almost immediately. Stretching from his temple and nicking his brow was a not inconsiderable white scar, shiny in the light. Lance reached up to touch it and was surprised to see that his fingers didn’t tremble much at all when he did.

He couldn’t say he remembered much beyond the agony of the whole experience, but thinking cynically, the scar was a reminder that they could never trust anything fully, not even their own handiwork. Lance decided he didn’t care much for that interpretation and turned back around with a grin and his hands on his hips.

“Just another asset to my already flawless appearance,” he boasted, smoothing his hair down before ruffling Pidge’s hair and meeting Hunk’s eyes. Allura laughed, Shiro shook his head fondly, and Lance pushed his hair away to better display the new addition. All that scar meant was that Lance should probably do his own damn laundry anyway.  



End file.
